


Samhain

by Ark



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: 'Tis The Season, Angst, Canon Era, Fortune Telling, Friends to Lovers, Halloweenish, Humor, M/M, Samhain, Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-31
Updated: 2017-11-01
Packaged: 2019-01-27 03:51:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,199
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12573096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ark/pseuds/Ark
Summary: “We will be together,” says Courfeyrac, grinning wider than the gourd in his hands, “for an evening without the present burdens of our epoch. Even Enjolras has sworn there will be no talk of politics or princes tonight.”





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> As promised—a treat (no tricks, I hope) for Halloween, long in the making. Impossible to bake without my exquisite beta [soemily](https://archiveofourown.org/users/goshemily/pseuds/goshemily), who keeps me honest and in Oxford commas. And a kiss to my dearest historical authority, [barricadeur](https://archiveofourown.org/users/barricadeur), who first (gently) broke the news that there would not have been Halloween in early 19th century France, and inspired me in a different direction. For all of my [tumblr](http://et-in-arkadia.tumblr.com) and ao3 loves who keep reading. I adore you.

Grantaire is ready at the appointed hour, dressed all in black as instructed. He is fastening on a rather sweeping black cape when a firm rap sounds at the door. 

“Coming, coming,” he tells the door, and jams his feet into boots. “This had best be worth the mystery, Jean. I do not enjoy surprises. I am told it is a personal failing and have added it to the list I keep of them.”

When he swings open the door, it is not to admit Jehan Prouvaire. All of his friends stand ringed behind the portal. All wear black, and some are masked. But he would know Courfeyrac’s fiery mane at a distance, and the glint of Enjolras’ golden curls even in pitchy darkness.

Now those curls and that mane are illuminated by strange, misshapen lanterns borne in their hands. Bahorel has an enormous one balanced on his shoulder, and when Grantaire squints at it he nearly starts back in terror. A hideous face is carved into the large vegetable Bahorel carries, hollowed out and lit by a candle from within. It leers back at Grantaire with a mouthful of broken teeth.

“Good God,” says Grantaire.

Jehan is at the front of the pack, and he smiles a beatific smile. “Tonight, it is Gods,” he tells Grantaire. “It is Samhain.”

Grantaire thinks he hides most of his surprise in seeming amused. He ducks down to collect a large bag crammed full of wine and brandy as Jehan had requested. “Bless me, I didn’t know we were in Ireland.”

“Samhain has no boundaries, save to thin the veil between the living and the dead,” replies Jehan, with a grave look.

“Jehan has been studying the holiday with a Celtic friend,” explains Combeferre, who mercifully carries a sack instead of a deformed vegetable. “For hundreds of years, for thousands, men and women have celebrated the end of the harvest and the birth of winter. I agreed with Jehan that it was a perfectly wonderful idea that we should do the same.”

“Perfectly wonderful,” repeats Grantaire, pulling his cloak tight around him. “And perfectly freezing. Are we to be outside, we pagans?”

“We will have a bonfire,” says Feuilly. “I will build it with my own hands.”

“We will drink,” says Bossuet, with a knowing wink for Grantaire. At his side Joly has another wink. “Jehan says that the festival positively requires drunkenness.”

“Well,” says Grantaire.

“We will divine our fortunes,” says Marius excitedly. “I have read a book Jehan lent me, and learned all the proper rituals.”

“We will be together,” says Courfeyrac, grinning wider than the gourd in his hands, “for an evening without the present burdens of our epoch. Even Enjolras has sworn there will be no talk of politics or princes tonight.”

“I have sworn,” agrees Enjolras, solemn, masked, from the back. He already sounds regretful.

“Fairy princes excluded,” Jehan is quick to add. “We may speak of them.”

Grantaire laughs. “All right. You are madmen, the lot of you. I’m persuaded.” He slings the clinking bag over his shoulder and steps out to join them in the hall. “So long as I don’t have to carry one of those abominations.”

“It is only a turnip,” protests Jehan. “Combeferre and I carved them. They are most traditional.”

“Did you have to give them teeth?” asks Grantaire. He falls in beside Enjolras, on the pretense of getting a closer look at the outsize turnip that he bears. “Where did you get teeth, anyway? Nevermind, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know. I shan’t sleep tonight.”

“None of us will sleep,” says Bahorel, no doubt enjoying the sonorous tone he gives his voice. “We will circle the bonfire until dawn, and keep watch to see if any spirits do visit us.”

“Surely you don’t believe--” Grantaire begins, but Combeferre silences him with a swift glance.

“There are many experiences in this world that even science cannot explain,” says Combeferre, as they troop out from Grantaire’s boarding house and take to the avenue. 

The night is dark, and the wind is blowing; a full moon is on the rise and will better light their way, but Grantaire can do with darkness for now. Their black-clad, mask-wearing, turnip-hoisting group is getting strange enough looks already. Still, Paris has seen far stranger sights, and no officer of the law stays their path.

Jehan turns an adoring expression on Combeferre, who quickly continues: “And even science, which I respectfully worship, has produced marvels that would have been once called magic. Science cannot preclude magic; it is merely one arm of the world’s wonders. Why, it was the great alchemists who gave us the first foundations of chemistry, and--”

Combeferre goes on at length, waxing philosophic, while the rest crane their heads and listen with great interest. Only Enjolras slows his steps, and Grantaire carefully matches them, until they trail in the group’s wake. Courfeyrac is at point, blazing turnip held high above his head, leading the way out of the city.

To Grantaire’s amazement, Enjolras takes his arm, shifts his glowing burden to the other. He draws Grantaire closer so that they might speak without being overheard. 

“At least I have one ally in reason tonight,” Enjolras says into Grantaire’s ear. “The others are caught up in this child’s play and will not drop the act.” 

“I am surprised to find you party to it,” allows Grantaire. The wind gusts icily past, cuts through their cloaks. He tucks Enjolras’ hand under his arm, against the heat of his body, a move that Enjolras’ imprudent lack of gloves allows. Enjolras has never called him reasonable before, nor deigned to take his arm, and the delight of it shivers down Grantaire’s spine. This is also excused by the wind. “Why did you agree?”

“Courfeyrac cajoled. Combeferre asked,” says Enjolras, and shrugs. “I cannot resist the both of them, not when their minds are set on an idea.” He darts a sideways glance at Grantaire, then looks forward. “They pointed out that I lack in amusements as of late. They were...not wrong.”

They showed great restraint and understatement, thinks Grantaire, but it is rare enough to get along so well with Enjolras. He is loath to spoil the mood. “I see,” says Grantaire, and nothing more, striving for diplomacy. He waits.

“And you, Grantaire,” Enjolras continues, proving that he is well aware of whose arm he holds (Grantaire has half-wondered). (No: more than half. He is dazed to have these fingers ring his arm.) “I am surprised that these games are not more to your liking. I would have thought you well-versed in fairy stories.”

Grantaire isn’t sure quite how to parse this; on the one hand, Enjolras is calling him well-read -- on the other, the mocking lilt in Enjolras’ voice shows what he thinks of the subject matter. 

“I have read enough that, if I believed, I should not want to meddle with fairies,” Grantaire answers. “Seldom are they invoked without great cost. They are covetous and clever, a dangerous combination.”

The mask that Enjolras wears is stiff-backed black velvet, cut to cover his eyes and nose but leaving bare his red mouth. Delicate curlicues of velvet spiral up to be buried in the gold of his hair. He cannot have owned such a lavish, carnivalesque thing. It must be Courfeyrac’s, and Grantaire does not know whether to damn or bless Courfeyrac for the loan. 

It is almost easier to speak to this Enjolras, who looks unlike himself, exotic and strange; who might be anyone, a beautiful stranger, save for the sideways sardonic twist of his lips. 

“Jehan is quite convinced tonight is the one evening on the whole calendar when ghosts may return with ease, or respond to summons,” Enjolras’ mouth tells him. “You do not believe in ghosts?”

“No,” says Grantaire. “No. I am quite more afraid that the dead stay buried than that they should rise again.”

It is difficult to read Enjolras’ expression with the mask in place. The look he gives Grantaire is inscrutable, but his blue eyes are brightly lit. Unless Grantaire is quite mistaken, when Enjolras speaks again he sounds excited. Excitable. “You share the opinion, then, that man only has one life -- that there is no hereafter.”

Heady, heavy discussion while their friends laugh and trot merrily before them. But Grantaire nods. “Indeed. The stories that the church sells to create supplicants I accord no more truth than tales of elves and fairies. And yet,” and yet, for he and Enjolras are never destined to be of one mind: “Where you seek to change the status quo, to alter the life we are given, I am quite resigned to it. And so I try to enjoy what pleasures are given to us. Dancing, drinking, laughter in cafes after dark, painting, theatricals, restaurants, revelry. I have but one life and I will live it.”

“You suggest I do not?” Now Enjolras’ voice is sharp.

“I did not say so,” says Grantaire, who has, inevitably, put his foot into it. It is impossible for him not to put a foot directly where it does not belong. “Only that we are set upon different paths. Perhaps that is why we often seem so far from one another.” 

“Perhaps.” Enjolras’ lips are flat now beneath the mask, but he does not pull his arm away, as Grantaire had feared, even as they approach a merchant gate on the city’s edge. Together they watch Courfeyrac grease the palms of the guards, who barely blink at the odd party before waving them through. 

They head into the open fields beyond the gate. Without the cover of buildings it is now quite cold, and Grantaire is within his rights to peel off his gloves and offer them to Enjolras when he shivers.

“You have equal need of them,” Enjolras protests, one golden eyebrow traveling up over the mask.

“Give me brandy, which I shall have soon enough, and my blood runs hot,” says Grantaire. “I insist.”

“Enjolras! Grantaire! Keep up, lest we leave you to be devoured by goblins in the dark!” Bahorel’s shout sounds pleased at the prospect, and they can hear him launch into a bloody story of marauding spirits designed to scare and delight the others. 

They put their shoulders to the wind, and hurry to rejoin the group. Enjolras puts on the gloves. Grantaire still keeps Enjolras’ arm tucked close, for warmth. 

*** * ***

Fanciful superstitions aside, it proves to be a perfectly wonderful idea for a party. Combeferre promised as much.

A great deal of Grantaire’s good mood can be attributed to the fact that Enjolras does not leave his side. Not even once they reach the clearing where the bonfire is to be built. Not even when others hail or draw him off. He returns. 

Each man takes up a task in preparation, and due his expertise the drinks fall to Grantaire. Enjolras declares he will have no part in constructing altars or feeding sacred herbs to the fire, and says that he will assist. 

Together they inventory the amassed bottles and measure out potions into tin cups, which are then distributed. Grantaire reserves the finest bottle of wine to be split between the two of them. 

As the full moon waxes overhead, even Enjolras starts to bend to the spirit of the evening, and drinks nearly in step with Grantaire.

Their skepticism sustains them in conversation through a range of earthly topics, yet it is hard not to be caught by their friends’ enthusiasm. Feuilly builds up a spectacular bonfire until rosy flames lick high into the air. So warmed, they ring and range around the fire, talking and laughing until Jehan calls for silence while he reads mystical invocations from dusty old books in his high, clear, passionate voice.

Enjolras slants over a look that Grantaire can read as amused even with his mask in place, and it feels natural for Grantaire to smile back.

Joly and Bossuet have brought instruments and become an impromptu band. It is Courfeyrac who starts the dancing, and he will not allow for abstention. Such is the amount of drink by then that there are no arguments. They all move together in circles around the fire in increasing frenzy and mingled laughter. 

It is only when it is very late, and Grantaire is watching Enjolras glide with liquid grace through light and shadow, that he comes to believe the evening may be enchanted after all. 

He is witnessing the impossible: Enjolras beside him, dancing, his golden head thrown back to send laughter toward the stars.

Combeferre gives them a rest at last, lets them collapse in the grass while he reads out ancient traditions of the harvest-time aloud. But Grantaire has barely caught his breath before Enjolras prods him to his feet once more.

“Our duties call,” says Enjolras, never more a Ganymede than with a brandy bottle in his hand, set on refilling cups. Grantaire lopes after him with the last of the wine, and they see their friends replenished.

“Sit with me!” cries Marius when they reach him, and he grabs for their hands. “You two have dodged for hours. I am telling fortunes, you know.”

“We know,” Enjolras breathes beside Grantaire, for his ears alone, and Grantaire returns a crooked grin. 

But Marius will not be waylaid. He tugs them down beside him, then reaches into the bag at his feet and brings out two shiny apples. 

He peels the green skin from one with a sharp knife, then lays the peelings in the grass and stares thoughtfully from its shape to Grantaire, then back again. He checks the book balanced on his leg to be sure, nods, smiles, then leans in to whisper to Grantaire his fortune.

Grantaire does not wish to hurt Marius’ feelings, but he laughs heartily to hear it. 

Marius shrugs. “This is the way it was done in Samhains past,” he says, solemn. “I did not create the omen. My hand was guided by your familiar spirits, Grantaire.” 

“I’m sure,” says Grantaire, and hefts his cup to swallow those spirits most familiar.

For Enjolras there is a red apple. Marius repeats the procedure, carefully freeing the fruit from its cover. He spreads out the skin and squints at it in the firelight. He blinks and leans closer. He turns it upside down, then rightside up again.

When he starts to leaf through the pages of the book, Enjolras, whose eyes are already rolling, loses his patience. 

“Out with it, Marius,” he snaps. “Or have the spirits gone silent?”

“No, but--” Marius flushes under his collar. “A bad apple, a poor peel, I apologize. I will try again.”

“Don’t bother,” says Enjolras, getting to his feet. He extends a hand. “Grantaire, I believe we missed Joly and Bossuet, and as our musicians tonight they will have the thirst upon them.”

Grantaire takes the hand to regain his footing, gives Marius an apologetic shrug, and gets to keep Enjolras’ fingers tangled in his as he is dragged back around the fire. They splash wine into the music-makers’ grateful cups. 

Then he stands beside Enjolras, who has his arms crossed and is staring into the flames, which have dampened in ardor. Feuilly is playing cards in the fading light with Bahorel and has quite abandoned his self-appointed post by the firewood.

“Nonsense,” mutters Enjolras, and Grantaire is unsure if he is being addressed, or if Enjolras simply gives voice to his thoughts outloud. “Not a bit of sense to any of this. I was unwise to indulge so far.” He yanks the black mask from its fastenings, and for a moment Grantaire is afraid he will cast it into the fire; but he turns at the last and tosses it into the weeds behind them.

“I agree that it is nonsense,” says Grantaire softly, and Enjolras starts and seems to see him again. “Yet there is always wisdom in camaraderie, and occasionally in indulgence.” He tilts his head. “Forgive me, but I could have sworn I saw you enjoying yourself.”

“Grantaire.” Enjolras sighs, turns to face him. He pushes a hand back through his yellow hair, tousled where the mask’s ties had clung. Grantaire nearly forgot the full force of his beauty when it was half-covered, and only just manages not to step back. “It is I who should ask forgiveness. You have had charge of me all night, and been patient. I tried, but I fear I am not suited to parties.” Enjolras looks, Grantaire thinks, suddenly miserable. Or long miserable and newly revealed. “To revels. To life’s pleasures.”

“But--”

“Nevermind, nevermind.” A mask made of stern determination settles over Enjolras’ face, more cloaking than velvet. He gestures to the open space by the fire. “Will you sit, and continue our discourse on philosophy from earlier? I hid half a bottle of wine in my satchel. I will fetch it.”

Grantaire can deny him nothing, and certainly will not turn down such an attractive offer. He nods, and settles where Enjolras indicated. “Imagine you saving wine!”

“I know my drinking-partner,” says Enjolras. He marches off before he can see Grantaire’s cheeks go red in the orange light. 

Grantaire sits still enough, for all that his heart is pounding painfully. When some minutes have passed without sign of Enjolras’ return, he scoots around the circle until Enjolras comes into view, and spots him, at a distance, arguing heatedly with Marius. 

Then Grantaire retreats back to where he is meant to wait, and waits. 

When Enjolras returns his lips are frozen in a smile, and he sits quite close to Grantaire and the fire, as though he cannot be warm enough.

*** * ***

“Grantaire. Grantaire, wake up.”

“...No.”

“Grantaire. It is our watch.”

“Enjolras?”

“I am.”

“Must we?”

“We drew the straw for the last watch.”

“I’m awake.” Grantaire’s eyes are closed. “I’m getting up.”

“You lie.”

Grantaire laughs. “Oh, very good.” He would stay like this -- here, on the cold, damp grass, where Enjolras had curled under a cloak beside him -- forever, if he could. At least another stretch of hours to secretly cherish. But as he is an expert at drinking, he is equally versed in pushing through the remains of wine-fog. He opens his eyes.

Barely grumbling now, he gets up and trails after Enjolras, away from their friends who sprawl near the crackling, glowing logs. Away and into the fields of tall grass beyond them. At a distance, the lights of Paris, which never go out, flicker and wink like knowing eyes.

Enjolras keeps charging through the faded grass as though they are pursued. Grantaire yawns and follows, too tired to offer protest. 

At last Enjolras slows, then stops. Their friends and the smoking fire are far off. Enjolras folds his arms around his chest. His hands in Grantaire’s gloves pull the edges of his cape in tight, and in the washed-out light of painfully early morning he appears to Grantaire both careworn and young, a discomfiting contrast. 

Someone with so few years should not be burdened by such troubles, thinks Grantaire, then frowns to realize the same might be said of himself.

For a long while they stand sentry side by side, without speaking, keeping guard over their own thoughts. Then Enjolras says, “I made Marius tell me my fortune.”

Grantaire blinks at him, but can think of no response that does not involve laughter, and Enjolras’ expression is far too sobering for that. He stays silent.

“You wish to joke about my believing that our Baron Pontmercy could be a seer,” says Enjolras. “It is not that I believe. But perhaps, as Combeferre said, not everything in the world can be spelled out by science or reason. Some things are true, and they are unreasonable, and inexplicable. They simply are. Maybe there is an order to it, to explain it. Can we say with conviction that nothing is preordained?” 

“Written in the stars, Jehan would say.” Grantaire shakes his head. “I don’t think you believe that, not really. Destiny denies man of self-will.” He tries to smile. “At least you cannot believe this magic of Marius. Now, if someone with Combeferre’s schooling took to reading tea-leaves, then perhaps--”

Enjolras says, “I wanted to know why he would not tell me. He told yours easily enough.”

“And what did Monsieur le Baron Seer see?”

“Death.” Enjolras pronounces the word flatly, without emotion. “For the others, gains in love and wealth or loss of it, or passing and failing of their exams, or the losing or finding of a precious object. For me, only death. He was horrified at the symbol, and confirmed it thrice in his book. He even cut me a second apple. Then there were two death’s heads, side by side.”

“The English have a good word for this,” says Grantaire. “That word is ‘codswallop.’” He turns to Enjolras, trying hard to keep his expression neutral, and not aghast. He does not do what he wants to do: shudder, from crown to toe. “Nonsense, utter nonsense, just as you said last night. Enjolras, listen to yourself. You’d let Marius Pontmercy tell your fortune from an apple-peel! I won’t stand to hear it.”

“Is he wrong?” Enjolras shrugs his shoulders, meets Grantaire’s eyes. “Have you not argued yourself that such will be my swift end, should I stay on my chosen path?”

“I have never claimed to know the future,” says Grantaire.

“No,” Enjolras agrees, and his expression softens. “Yet is he wrong?”

To this Grantaire can say nothing. Enjolras nods, a dip of his head. “I admit it was somewhat of a shock to hear my end pronounced so bluntly. And I wondered why, of all our number, only I am given death and nothing else foreseen. I think it is because, as you said, I live as though I were not alive already.”

“I did not say such a thing,” protests Grantaire. “I would not.”

“Perhaps I only thought it, then.” For the space of some breaths they stand staring again, unspeaking, this time at each other and not out across the rolling fields, which are dry and yellowed from the early icy fall. Grantaire is the first to drop his gaze.

Enjolras says, “What did Marius predict for you?”

“Rubbish,” says Grantaire tightly. “Utter codswallop.”

“Then tell me, if you do not believe.”

Grantaire is glad that he is looking away, looking down. “He said I would have my heart’s desire.”

The wind, now a breeze, stirs the grass at their feet. There is dew on Grantaire’s boots. A snail is making slow progression in the dirt.

“You laughed at Marius,” Enjolras remembers, damn him. “Is that so far-fetched?”

“It is impossible.” When Grantaire can look at Enjolras with some measure of composure, he is almost angry. “Let us not speak of foolish superstitions and mystical hogwash.”

“Indulge me a few moments more. I thought to read your palm, as I have seen done in the market.” 

Before Grantaire can react, Enjolras has caught his hand. When Grantaire does not pull away, Enjolras cradles it in his own, still wearing Grantaire’s gloves. He gazes down at the lines there. His long hair is tangled from their night on the ground, and there are leaves and twigs mixed in with the pale curls. He looks, thinks Grantaire wildly, a proper fairy.

“Enjolras--”

“Your thoughts are chaotic and untamed,” Enjolras pronounces. “You despair of them.”

“Anyone who knows me would say as much,” Grantaire admits, wondering if he should take back his hand. Whatever Enjolras is playing at is unfathomable. “Even Marius.”

“You imagine Marius thought to cheer you with his prediction,” Enjolras points out, “yet he could not tell me a lie.”

“I--”

“You think often of one person especially,” says Enjolras. His voice is so hushed that the breeze swallows it. “A man.”

Grantaire could not speak then if it meant the difference between life or death. He ceases to breathe, standing between those gates.

“You are convinced he does not see you,” Enjolras continues, his eyes on the pathways of Grantaire’s palm, as though there is text there to be translated. “You see him as fearless, and without his flaws, and because of that, the truth escapes you. You do not know that he is afraid. He is untested. His fear cloaks him in bravado.” 

Enjolras leans forward; his hair cascades in a molten river, hiding his face; his lips brush Grantaire’s palm soft as a bird’s wing, so soft that Grantaire has surely imagined it. Because Enjolras is still speaking. “A greater terror overtakes him. That he will die without having lived as he should. Without having loved. This has become more frightening than death, for he believes -- both of you believe -- that there is nothing after. What, then, can be done with the one life we have?”

He raises his head, and Grantaire can see that he is afraid.

Grantaire tightens his hand around Enjolras’, closes off his palm and fits their fingers together. “Try to enjoy what pleasures are left to us,” he whispers, repeating the answer he gave some hours and a lifetime ago. He is trembling, dizzy, disbelieving. His voice is hoarse from the smoke off the fire and all the songs they sang around it. Enjolras’ hand is warm, enclosed in Grantaire’s leather glove.

Enjolras nods. When he kisses Grantaire, he tastes of hidden wine. He smells of apples, two peeled and laid side by side.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Enjolras raises his eyes to meet Grantaire’s, expression no longer haughty but still overridingly stubborn. “You misunderstood me, Grantaire. I am not afraid of the acts of love, only untried. What frightens me is you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For my preferred Enjolras and the best beta, [soemily](http://soemily.tumblr.com/), and for everyone reading. I adore you so.

Grantaire lies abed until midday, enjoying the softness of his mattress compared to the grassy ground of Samhain. 

He stares at the cracks in the ceiling, counts every one, counts the tiles on the red roof across from his window, counts the birds that wing past. He counts out time between the church bells that mark the hours, counts his fluttering heart-beats.

When the afternoon has arrived and advanced, when he can delay and wait no longer, he rises. He begs a quick soak in his landlady’s tub, then retreats back to his rooms with a basin of heated water. There he manages a thorough shave for the first time in months, a minor miracle considering how unsteady his hands are. He longs to quiet their tremor with wine or whiskey but drinks none. He spends some time combing the knots from his wet hair. He avoids his own eyes in the looking-glass.

He dresses with care, in his best, cleanest clothes, and emerges from the house at least halfway presentable. He asks himself where he thinks he is going, if he has truly gone mad. 

He stops a half-dozen times on his walk across the city. Twice he nearly pauses at the entrance to a tavern, and once he must be dissuaded from purchasing a bouquet of flowers. In the end he only brings himself.

His destination is the top floor of a neat, respectable boarding house. It would only be a minute’s work to bound up the stairs. Grantaire takes ten or more, pausing at each consecutive landing. When he reaches the designated door, he makes up his mind to leave.

Fate -- or chance -- or something as inexplicable, as unreasonable -- would not have it so, for just then the door swings open, and Enjolras collides with Grantaire in the midst of his own hasty departure.

The shock of the encounter rocks them in place. At last Grantaire grips the doorjamb, and Enjolras also, before they both tumble over. Then he straightens up and drops his hands. He is glad he did not bring flowers.

“You are on your way out,” says Grantaire, shoulders squared, stating the obvious so that there is something to say. Enjolras is also smartly dressed, his cheek freshly shaven. “I was just. That is to say --”

Still seeming startled by their collision, Enjolras’ color is high and his mouth is slightly open. He snaps it shut, but does not seem annoyed; he smiles a little; and to have him so close again Grantaire can let himself believe what passed between them was real. 

That Enjolras kissed him with that same smiling mouth. That Enjolras kept kissing him, when Grantaire did not pull away. 

That Grantaire gathered Enjolras into his arms, ran his fingers through that gleaming hair, kissed back like a man offered his heart’s desire and grasping it with both hands --

“Ah, Grantaire.” Enjolras also seems at a loss for speech, so chooses action, moving backwards over the threshold. “Indeed I was leaving, but you save me the trip. Come in.”

“You sought me?” Grantaire knows many words; he is able to voice three of them. He steps forward, and Enjolras shuts the door behind him, and they are quite alone.

“I -- yes.” Enjolras’ eyes are round as he throws the bolt. He is more nervous than Grantaire had thought it possible for him to be. His hands tremble like a drunkard’s, like Grantaire’s this morning. 

Grantaire wants to take him into his arms again. He wants to do far more than that. He finds he can do nothing but stand stock-still in Enjolras’ tiny front hall. The room he spies beyond is nearly as small. Trust Enjolras to let quarters as frugal and spare as a monk’s.

“You look -- very -- well,” Enjolras manages, quite purple in color now. “Did you -- sleep -- well?” 

And he looks so distraught then, so out of his depth and unlike himself, that Grantaire takes pity on him. On them both. He decides to cut to the quick of it, even if it means a swift and sure rejection.

“No,” says Grantaire, truthful. “Not a moment’s rest. Not when all I could see before me was this.” 

He crosses the remaining space and now it is he who kisses first: kisses as he’s long dreamed of kissing Enjolras, day-dreamed and night-dreamed and all the time in-between. 

A firm kiss, then softer. His tongue dares the sweep of Enjolras’ full lower lip. Grantaire’s eyes are open and unafraid of the action -- afraid only of reaction. But Enjolras is looking back, no longer afraid. Yes, just like this. Just so.

He is wholly unprepared for how Enjolras melts against him, for the heat of Enjolras’ arms twined around his neck, for the way Enjolras’ mouth yields willingly to gentle pressure and Grantaire’s tongue gains entrance to sacred depths. 

Before long Grantaire must tear himself away. “What!” he exclaims. “You can’t go about kissing a man like that.”

Enjolras looks neither quizzical nor cross. He looks pleased, triumphant, as though this kiss had also been of his idea and execution. “Can’t I?”

“Very well.” Grantaire kisses him again. Again, again, he’ll never have enough of this so long as he is living.

“Grantaire.” At that moment, since Grantaire is kissing his neck, Enjolras regains the use of his voice. 

“Yes?”

“Are we to stand in the hall?” Enjolras’ question is reasonable, but considering Grantaire would accept a barren field, a frozen wasteland, a circle of hell, location be damned so long as he does not have to cease from kissing Enjolras, ever, the question takes a while to permeate. Finally Enjolras tries again. “I have a bed, you know.”

“A bed?”

“A bed. That is, if you wish to…”

“A bed.” 

Enjolras’ laugh is wondrously muffled against Grantaire’s neck. “We can call it something else if you prefer.”

“I like ‘bed’ quite well.” Grantaire is busy kissing his ear. “I like to hear you say ‘bed.’”

“You are a beast,” says Enjolras.

“You cannot know that yet,” says Grantaire. He is sure his gaze is sly.

“If one could guess.” And, oh, Enjolras’ eyes are wicked too. Grantaire must kiss him again for it. 

“Where are you going?” Grantaire demands.

“To bed!”

Grantaire reaches, catches Enjolras’ wrist, draws him back. “I am a fool, a damned fool,” he tells Enjolras’ curious eyes. “Yet I am one, and fools can speak their minds; it is the one boon given them. Fools may tell truths to kings. So I must say: be not so hasty.”

The mask of indifference -- which Grantaire now knows signifies uncertainty -- threatens to descend across Enjolras’ features. “Then you do not wish to…?”

“I did not say that. I wish everything of the kind. But there is no need for haste.” Grantaire hesitates, then presses his palm to Enjolras’ cheek. That touch alone bodes more intimacy than he would have ever believed himself permitted. “Yesterday we were but friends, uneasy ones at that, and only just this morning something else. You confessed certain fears. I would not increase them with undue speed.”

Enjolras raises his eyes to meet Grantaire’s, expression no longer haughty but still overridingly stubborn. “You misunderstood me, Grantaire. I am not afraid of the acts of love, only untried. What frightens me is you.”

“Me!” It takes great forbearance not to step away from him.

“Pardon, I did not mean it to sound like that. It is the feelings that I have where you are concerned that overwhelm and leave me unbalanced. Unlearned. Faced with these proofs I feel ignorant, and that is a most fearful state to dwell in.” Enjolras places his own hand over Grantaire’s, where it rests against his cheek. “I am not accustomed to such speeches. Already I muddle my intent.”

“Oh, no. Speak on of these emotions that involve me. Don’t tell him, but you already make finer poetry than Prouvaire.”

Enjolras’ lips crook a small smile. “I will never be a poet,” he tells Grantaire. “Fine words and high romance elude me.” He pauses, then appears resolved, and continues apace: “A year ago I would have said you were quarrelsome, difficult, a distraction to our group. Yet as the year progressed I came to see that there was wisdom in the observations and warnings you gave, and that you were the cause of an entirely different sort of distraction.”

“Continue,” murmurs Grantaire, head ducked so that his hair falls before his eyes.

“The way you looked at me was at first a nuisance,” says Enjolras, and now it is he who stares, studying Grantaire’s face. “Yet it caused me to look back. And the more I looked...”

All at once their positions are reversed, they are spun, Enjolras has him pressed against the wall. He reaches for Grantaire’s cravat and hooks his finger under the knot, then hauls him into a kiss as searing as his first had been tentative. 

“We need not hurry,” Enjolras says into his mouth, “but I am in no mood to wait.”

Overcome, over the moon, Grantaire can but return the ready embrace. Then it is he who pushes them from the wall. 

“Where are you going?” Enjolras blinks.

“To bed, to bed!” 

 

***

 

The sun is sinking low across Enjolras’ windowsill, the darkness of November trailing after. Grantaire does not mind. The whole world is illuminated by a flickering candle and the fiery brilliance of Enjolras’ unbound hair.

It spills across his narrow shoulders, the finely made planes of his chest. His skin is marble veined with threads of ruby and sapphire. Enjolras is Galatea made flesh and come alive by the grace of Gods, for that perfect skin shades to pink and darker red under Grantaire’s open mouth. 

Grantaire’s mouth is employed in learning every new uncovered inch of Enjolras. The first pass, Grantaire uses only the lightest pressure of lips. On the second he introduces his tongue. 

When his tongue is first employed between Enjolras’ legs, Enjolras swats at his shoulder in surprise; within the space of breaths, his hand is buried in Grantaire’s hair to keep him in place, the start of astonishment transmuted into a desperate moan.

To make Enjolras moan is the reason Grantaire was set upon the earth, he knows then. He is a sudden believer in predestination. But still he moves slowly, achingly careful, until the both of them ache. 

“Grantaire.” Enjolras says the name thick with pleasure, heavy and weighted as his waiting cock. His cock is bold, proud, hard, and beautiful and Grantaire’s every resistance is tested to keep his attention elsewhere.

“Mmm,” agrees Grantaire, occupied with tracing letters -- that form soundless affirmations -- into the taut skin of Enjolras’ thigh.

“You dally,” says Enjolras, low-voiced, his head pushed deep into the pillow, his fine hands curled into fists. But he sounds unsure enough that Grantaire smiles against his skin.

“Yes,” Grantaire agrees again, “and no. With you spread before me I might pass a hundred and one nights, and not notice the passage of time.” He moves, ducks down, daringly licks. His tongue is mischievous, knowing, quick, and its explorations make Enjolras gasp.

Enjolras gasps, “And if -- in that hundred nights or so -- I should like to have a turn?”

It takes a while, but Grantaire eventually pauses. “You may,” he allows, magnanimous. He has already found that in bed, Enjolras enjoys a command, prefers giving over to him. A reversal of their norms, unexpected at first, but not so strange for men in bed, thinks Grantaire. This is where men reveal their hidden selves. 

And so, when they are reversed -- when it is Grantaire with his head pressed to the pillow, and Enjolras is astride and alight above him -- Grantaire can see with perfect clarity why this whole exercise matters; why it has happened now; can glimpse, even, why he was chosen to receive such grace. 

In bed, Enjolras may be tentative. He will be commanded. He can show uncertainty, express doubt, exist without ready answers. In his classes he must excel, shine brilliant for the teachers and his family’s expectations; in the club he must be perfectly sure of his convictions, the torchbearer their friends follow without hesitation. When he goes to recruit men and women to his cause in the streets, he must be a heroic figure, bold and cool as the marble Grantaire has ascribed to him. 

Enjolras is a young man yet, with fears and wonderings the same as any other; but unlike others he has not allowed himself an outlet nor a vice or three to relieve the pressure that living builds up daily in the brain. 

Thus, at last, this yielding, when he has come to realize the time left to him may be short. The giving-in to experience more than what he has known, the natural curiosity in those pleasures that Grantaire has described and offered with his pointed gaze every day he looked upon Enjolras. 

It would take a man of total conviction to deny himself all the trappings of life, when life is so threateningly brief, and though Enjolras has more drive than any person in Grantaire’s acquaintance, his conviction is not entire. He is young, and there is more to learn, always more. 

Only when he is satisfied that every question has been answered, thinks Grantaire, will Enjolras arrive at the resolution that he seeks.

Grasping his role in full, embracing it, Grantaire lets Enjolras’ tongue plumb his mouth, extract his secrets. He closes his eyes and lets himself understand why it is he who is here, and not some willing friend who already shares Enjolras’ mind, or some willing stranger, found easily, who would have come to partake of Enjolras’ beauty. 

No, it is Grantaire, because Grantaire already wanted him, Grantaire was an easy puzzle to solve toward that end; and it is Grantaire because Enjolras may show Grantaire his true face now -- untested, worried, excited, afraid, exultant, and be assured that he will not be exposed or betrayed.

It is Grantaire who loves him beyond measure, who has professed it enough to bore the idea, this solution, deep into Enjolras’ brain. Grantaire’s steadiness in this singular pursuit, where he showed no such application elsewhere, that turned him into the prime candidate.

“You caused me to look back,” Enjolras had said, “And the more I looked…” He had not finished the thought aloud, simply distracted them both by pinning Grantaire against the wall with his mouth. 

“What frightens me is you,” Enjolras had said. Because while he fretted and pondered if he should try this side of life, he knew Grantaire to be the bridge to it, rickety though Grantaire may be, full of rotted steps, yet dedicated to bearing Enjolras to the other side. 

Grantaire will take him there, and not mark or judge Enjolras’ indecision, his uncertainty, his unskilled hands. Grantaire shivers everywhere their skin touches, as though Jehan’s ghosts have followed them from the fields to haunt their bed. Grantaire will never tell another living soul of this.

This is Grantaire’s bridge into the world of the dead, where Enjolras will one day guide him.

Enjolras draws back, his angel’s face showing knitted brows. “You’re shivering.”

“I want only for a certain kind of warming,” says Grantaire, with arch suggestion. “You would make for an excellent cover, atop me as you are, but more firmly tucked in.”

Enjolras does not miss his meaning. “-- Yes,” he manages after pause for breath, his expression a profound study in warring instinct. His vitality, his curiosity, his humanity win out at last: “Should I--”

“We need a little oil,” says Grantaire. His throat feels dry; he swallows, but the relief is slight. Oil to anoint the dead, he thinks. 

No. 

No, he’ll not give in to his morbidity, not yet, not now, not when he is being offered the key to heaven, if only for an evening. “Oil for cooking, if you have it, or--”

To his great surprise Enjolras need not go far in this pursuit, but leaves off belting Grantaire’s hips to access a small cupboard by the bedside. He retrieves a vial, sweet-smelling when he uncorks it, cloyingly floral, such as they sell in darkened shops of ill-repute. Startled, Grantaire would very much like to have a look at what else is contained within the cupboard, but Enjolras clicks it closed. 

The vial is half-full. Grantaire raises both eyebrows, but Enjolras mirrors him, raising his own. He settles back by Grantaire -- not over him now, but between Grantaire’s knees, which Grantaire parts. 

“I did not say,” says Enjolras, deliciously unembarrassed, proud, even, “that I had never attempted anything of the kind. An untaught man must seek his own education. I did not anticipate that I should ever have a tutor in this.”

“Ah,” says Grantaire, who must shut his eyes against the barrage of images this confession conjures. Who must readjust his evaluation of the heights of Enjolras’ chastity, and realize that no matter how adept one man might be at reading another, he can never be assured of guessing at the inner secrets of the soul. Perhaps, thinks Grantaire, while Enjolras seeks answers, Grantaire does not know all of the questions in advance. He guesses at a question, then, to ask: “Show me what you have tried?”

When Enjolras’ slick fingers breach him, they are without style or speed, a slow, exploring quest of a motion. Grantaire bites the meat of his own forearm to stifle a groan, not wanting to put Enjolras off with too much shocked sound; but the first push of fingers nearly undoes Grantaire. 

He had anticipated hesitancy at this step, total ignorance, the need to patiently instruct and beguile and even plead, yet there is Enjolras kneeling between Grantaire’s thighs, not needing to be taught, simply awaiting permission. 

Enjolras is watching his own hand, and when his fingers have advanced enough he crooks them, and Grantaire is indeed undone. He opens his mouth but no words come forth. 

It is a night of firsts for them both.

“Do I pain you, Grantaire?” And Grantaire shakes his head: no, no, no, no, so Enjolras continues, this time with his upturned face examining Grantaire’s. 

“I astonish you,” says Enjolras. He sounds amused, emboldened. “You had imagined me entirely a nun in a cloistered garden.” 

Grantaire swallows: his throat is a desert, parched. This, he is used to, an unslakable thirst that has followed him forever. He has long imagined his mind to be the same, to be the cause of it all, a barren place of dunes and dusky winds where nothing green and wholesome will take root. 

Enjolras is all water, mercurial, shifting, a tempestuous storm, relentless as the tide. The vital force of him, the incursion of him inside Grantaire, seems to tap a hidden spring, and the deeper Enjolras goes the more Grantaire can float away from himself. 

Grantaire says, “I would never presume such a thing. Have you read de Sade? He tells us that the nuns are the most perverse of all.”

Enjolras laughs. It is good to hear him laugh in the night-shrouded room. “I have read de Sade,” he says, twists three fingers with a hint of sharpness when Grantaire shudders to hear it. “Perhaps we will find occasion to study him together.” 

And Grantaire laughs also, makes himself laugh so that he will not weep: now he has so much water within him. 

The idea of Enjolras, alone with book and candle and reading the most deviant works of France’s invention, is sustaining; but the suggestion that this act will stretch into another day, that they will revisit this bed, is almost too much for Grantaire to take. 

“Come,” Grantaire hears himself say. “That is quite good. If you do not want for instruction, show me what else you have gleaned from your books.”

Enjolras is ready; has been awaiting such a signal. Soon he has the oil and his cock in his hand, and the two combined. When he hesitates, Grantaire’s panicked brain screams that Enjolras’ will has failed, that his reason has returned, that the fairy-spell has broken. All is at an end. It is enough, more than enough, to have come so far into hidden lands. 

But Enjolras says, “How should you like to be?” and for a long dazed moment Grantaire cannot translate such a question, has infinite answers and none. 

Then he realizes that it is a simple query, wrenching in its well-intentioned innocence. Grantaire responds by turning facedown on the bed, by climbing to his hands and knees.

A gift, of course, it would have been, to see Enjolras’ face. To see how his face changes as he crosses this threshold for the first time. But some sights are not made for mortal eyes, and Grantaire thinks then of Semele, loved by the King of the Gods, tricked into asking to see him in all his glory. Zeus’ lightning, his true form, had overwhelmed her, and she burned up on the spot; 

and this is what will become of him, thinks Grantaire, should he choose to look while Enjolras enters him. 

Instead he keeps his head down, his dark hair a veil where he can hide from such glories, his hands bunched up with bedsheet. Enjolras does not know that Grantaire will be consumed if he stays on his back, but he does not question the choice. He moves into position and plies for entrance. A half-second’s struggle while Grantaire breathes out, and he is admitted.

Perhaps Grantaire was made for this, he has trained for this, certainly, he has been had by men and women in admirable numbers. And yet here is the one man he’s longed for since first sight and resigned never to touch. That self-knowledge altered within a day, within a night under the full moon during a time hallowed for spirits. It stretches all the bounds of reality and reason. He no longer knows himself.

They are like one of the old stories Combeferre had read before the fire, Grantaire decides then, his mind racing too fast, Atalanta after apples: they are people transformed by a visit to ethereal plains. 

Perhaps they were gone a thousand years last night, perhaps they took a wrong turn on their watch and stumbled through a rip in time and spent a millenia together, then were made to forget it. It is the only explanation for this.

For it should feel odd and new to take Enjolras inside him, but it does not. Enjolras should struggle with his inexperience, but he does not. Enjolras thrusts smoothly deep and Grantaire receives him with practiced, perfect welcome, as though they have attempted this dance before and long since mastered it. 

Grantaire cries out: not from pain -- there is none -- not from pleasure -- though it is considerable. He voices his wonderment while Enjolras comes to rest heavy on his back. 

Enjolras’ lips find his ear. “Ah, Grantaire,” he says. His tone is rough, surprised, alive. “I did not know that it would feel like this.”

Grantaire cannot say: it never does. It never has and never will again, this is something different, this is the province of old gods. He says, instead, “Should you but move, it will grow better.” He closes his eyes.

It was not enough to turn his face away from watching Enjolras. Grantaire is consumed. 

Lightning builds beneath his skull and crackles down the joints of his spine, collects in his toes to begin its journey anew. His mind is molten. He will not survive this, this fitting and refitting of Enjolras inside him, this revelation that they are composed to fit together. 

Enjolras is emboldened, moves faster, thrusts harder. He runs his hands along the lines of Grantaire’s body, clutches at his hip, threads fingers in Grantaire’s hair. He threatens to gather it up and tear back the protective veil from Grantaire’s eyes. 

Enjolras is distracted, testing his new power, growing more powerful with every reentry. He is a young Zeus, experimental. He drops Grantaire’s hair and palms down his chest, finds and fists Grantaire’s cock. It is advanced work but Grantaire has ceased to be surprised because he is burning up from the inside out. 

“Say but a word,” Enjolras says, and somehow Grantaire hears him through the conflagration in his head, hears him sound suddenly unsure, “you are too quiet, you who are never quiet.” Do fairies experience uncertainty? Do even gods have doubts? 

Grantaire knows a dozen tongues but no words for this. But he opens his mouth, when air arrives to feed his flames, and he says, “Enjolras,” with all that he is and all that he will be and all that he was before. In stories names can vanquish and summon, they are powerful: now they are the spell that reassures Enjolras and keeps him going, urges him onward. 

Grantaire can say naught else, but he can encourage with his body also, he can ride back on Enjolras’ proud cock and arch his supple back and Grantaire can thrust, too, hard, into Enjolras’ grip. 

So what if Grantaire is consumed. So what if this is the end of him. Fire is cleansing. Lightning illuminates and points the way. Now he knows Semele’s last moments were not so tragic: her eyes glimpsed the full glory of the King of the Gods. She died with the revealed mystery of the universe that no one else has ever seen. She died receiving all that she had asked for. Who else can make such a claim?

All at once radiant ecstasy joins the lightning, grows stronger than lightning and Grantaire is pulled along by it as he would be taken by a tidal wave out to sea. He comes in Enjolras’ hand, less a relief than a release, a letting go that shakes him, storm-tossed, so that he pulls Enjolras along with him. 

A muffled exclamation -- a curse, wonderful and terrible, from charmed lips -- and Enjolras, buried deep, spills and spills, and unaccountably the unquenchable fire goes out and Grantaire is saved, he is preserved, he is whole.

Enjolras withdraws and falls to the side, turns onto his back, breathing quickly. Grantaire knows then that Enjolras is but a man again, a young man relishing his first conquest, but still he cannot look at him. He stays hidden behind his tangled hair, permitting himself only to extend his hand, which touches the back of Enjolras’ with two fingertips.

Enjolras twists away -- to turn his wrist palm-up and take Grantaire’s hand, slotting their fingers. “That was better done than I expected, in my first attempt,” he says after a time, as though they are given over to honest self-evaluation after an exam, as though the planet entire has not tilted, then spun free from its axis. Grantaire cannot see him, but he knows now that Enjolras is worrying his lip. “Will you still not speak, Grantaire?”

Grantaire cannot. He wants to laugh, hysterical, with his head thrown back, body-racking laughs until tears arrive to drown him; he wants to shriek with the fervent pitch maenads used when they roamed ancient woods to find men to tear apart. Maenads who followed the god Dionysus, who was forged in his mother Semele’s fire. He swipes his tongue across cracked lips. He fears he is unravelling.

“It was,” says Grantaire when he remembers his mother tongue. He had almost spoken in Greek long since dead. “It was well done.” 

Because Enjolras needs this from him, he finds the strength to sweep back his hair and emerge from behind it with a smile on his face. 

“I fear I shall not recover,” says Grantaire.

Enjolras’ relief and pride are palpable. In the soft glow of the room he has never been more beautiful than he is now, relaxed, glutted with pleasure, for a moment unburdened. The pennant of his hair is not blown by a furious wind; its golden silk is lank with the sweat born of lust and considerable effort. His exquisite limbs are rosy with color, his spent cock against his thigh still stirring, as though he might revive to action again, and soon. Enjolras wallows in his newfound accomplishment. 

In another life he could have made for a glorious libertine, encouraging mind-expanding revolution among the people in beds instead of in arms.

Enjolras’ pleased expression changes. Grows stern. “I’ve injured you,” he says, unaccountably, until his fingers find Grantaire’s cheek. His thumb slides along Grantaire’s cheekbone, which is wet with tears.

“No. No.” Grantaire turns his head, presses a kiss to Enjolras’ palm. “You did not. You could not. It was a passing sad thought, a shadow, only. I am given to them. Pay me no mind.”

The kiss, the words, seem to work to settle him. Enjolras gives in to his pillow once more, to an easy sprawl. His concern dissipates. Shadows do not stalk him. 

How Grantaire envies him nearly as much as he loves him. 

For a time they rest like that: Enjolras, drowsing in contented triumph, Grantaire at his side grappling with racing thoughts and cruel, silent admonitions. They tell him he is unworthy to stay here, that all that has passed has been a mistake, a lie that will soon be exposed. 

If any man were to address one of his friends in the caustic tone Grantaire takes with himself, he would challenge that man to a duel on the spot. Yet it is his natural state, he thinks, this violent self-flagellation: it is what he deserves. He deserves nothing. He is nothing. He is a failure in all he undertakes, and if they two have succeeded tonight, if they have transcended the bounds of the known world, it is because of Enjolras. 

Grantaire is a worm in muck, snatched up for a moment, shown the sun and told that he might pretend to be a butterfly; but now that is finished. He must rise, and go from here, from this enchanted bed that he stole into for an evening. He must not look back or else be lost. 

When he sees Enjolras at the next gathering of their friends, perhaps Enjolras will nod at him. They will not speak of it, and Grantaire will never tell another living soul. It will be more, far more, than he has earned. This reward is unfathomable. 

He should be cast out for the presumption of daring to darken Enjolras’ doorstep after receiving his heart’s desire: a kiss as they stood in dry fall grass, mustard-yellow. Enjolras scented with Marius’ death’s head apples. Enjolras, who read his palm, as one might read the lines in a secret book.

“I thought,” Enjolras murmurs sleepily beside him, “that in the morning we might try again with some variation. I do not favor de Sade’s philosophy, but I admit to finding his ideas intriguing. There are a few theses I would test.” 

Grantaire’s heart is in his throat. “Would you,” he says. He must sound strangled by his heart.

Enjolras cracks an eye. “Had you plans to go?” Both eyes, blue, narrowed, are now open. “You would leave me after such an awakening?”

“You must cast me out,” Grantaire says. “My usefulness is expended. I cannot pretend to have a place here.” And then, unable to control the boundary between his speech and the speech in his head: “I thought you selected me for this service to an end, because you knew my feelings, and knew I would follow you down the path of your choosing. We spoke of life’s pleasures, and any man might be tempted to try them. Any man who knew you would answer your temptation. Before you had me I imagined that I offered an hour’s sport, of vulnerability and newness and diversion. I pictured myself a bridge to a distant horizon that you would pass over.” 

Enjolras presses his lips, looks as though he would say many things. His opened eyes show hurt; they say, did you truly think this of me, and in that instant Grantaire wishes he had burned up upon their bed. He should be reduced to ashes. But what Enjolras says is, “And after? I. Had you?”

“I do not know what that was,” Grantaire admits, for he has nothing left to lose. “For me it was everything, the beginning and the end of the world. Now that I have seen the end, I must leave. It is finished. All is concluded and resolved.” He knows that he labors without logic, but there is no other way to explain to Enjolras why he cannot stay beside until morning, like any other man would. Any other man would bind himself to the headboard to be certain that he would not lose his place.

“Grantaire.” Why Enjolras moves closer to him, does not shove him free and call him madman, Grantaire cannot fathom. “How your mind plays tricks on you.” 

Enjolras shakes his head, reaches to touch Grantaire’s cheek again, where the tear-tracks have dried. “If you would know my mind, I will tell you that for me, this was a beginning. It surpassed my expectations in every way, and for that I am grateful. You have, yourself, surpassed all expectations, and if you leave my bed with such haste I must blame myself, and see myself as lacking.” 

Enjolras hesitates when Grantaire does not take that bait and respond. He considers, choosing words, then says, “You are not wrong in some of your estimations, about how I came to think on you at first. I thought that was understood between us. Did we not say? I knew you sympathetic, and allowed myself the sympathy I had long denied, trusting that in this endeavor I would be safe. I am more selfish than you give me credit. I am inordinately selfish. I must be, to ask others to believe my own convictions above the ones that they are born and trained to accept. But,” says Enjolras, and he slips his hand into Grantaire’s wayward hair, tightens his fingers there, “I would not ask all that I have of you, share what we have shared, simply to leave you behind at its conclusion. No. It is only the beginning. If you will have it, and me.”

Grantaire keeps still for a long while, awash in words, buoyed on their sudden ocean. He is not cured; nothing can cure him, he thinks, but if Enjolras believes, who is Grantaire to tell him otherwise? 

No, thinks Grantaire, that is not right: they started out, last night, a thousand years ago, because neither of them are believers, because neither is willing to give credence to stories made to make the world seem less terrible, more promising, than it is. Enjolras desires to tell his own tale, to shape the arc and length of it, and he is offering to expand its text to include Grantaire. 

It is incredible, awe-inspiring, a shocking twist, that Grantaire should be allowed to be a part of Enjolras’ story. Yet here they are, writing it together.

“Tell me more about the morning,” says Grantaire. Enjolras kisses him.

“One thing first, before we discourse on de Sade,” Enjolras says, pulling Grantaire under the half-circle of one arm. “You have not remarked upon our lighting. Did it escape your notice?”

Grantaire lifts his head, not going far. He cranes his neck towards the singular illumination in the room, which, in his distraction, he had mistaken for a lone candle. 

There is a candle indeed, flickering yellow-white-blue. It is ensconced within the leering head of hand-carved turnip, set against the window to banish the darkness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Are you on tumblr? I'm on [tumblr.](http://et-in-arkadia.tumblr.com/) Let's hang out.  
>   
> Feedback is much appreciated, but your eyeballs alone are some of my favorite in the world. Thanks for reading.


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